·Free Republic:
Forum: 'Norman and Saxon' (1100 A.D.)(a
song written by Rudyard
Kipling for C.R.L. Fletcher's ‘A History of England’; there is also a discussion,from 2003, after the song; I haven’t read the whole discussion,
but it does mention some possible additional resources about relationships
between Normans and Saxons such as the book ‘Ivanhoe’; I have personally heard that ‘Ivanhoe’ is boring
because it is exceedingly descriptive)

“The ancients were astounded by many perceivedstereotypical characteristics of the Celts: they were

·Extremely large and tall
in stature;

·They lackedmanners
and morals;

·Their skin was pale
and flushed in anger;

·Their hair was red-gold
and often bleached;

·They were often poorly
groomed.

The Greeks and Romans also viewed their Celtic counterparts
with suspicion.

·The men were seen
as unrefined,

·The women as
flamboyantly uninhibited.

·The were said to be pre-occupied
with vanity, but

·Were given credit for
their war-like nature of their men.

The Roman Ammianus Marcellinus writes:

‘A whole troop of
foreigners [i.e. Romans] would not be able to withstand a single Gaul if he called his wife to his assistance. [...]
Swelling her neck, gnashing her teeth and brandishing her sallow arms of
enormous size, she begins to strike blows mingled with kicks as if they were
so many missiles sent from the string of a catapult.’

Greeks and Romans alike, to whom the Celts were contemporaries,
also viewed the Celtic people as prodigious eaters and drinkers. Large
feasts that lasted several days were a common occurrence in Celtic life…

Celtic social behaviour and interaction
between the sexes was often misunderstood and misrepresented by contemporary
writers and observers. Many accused the Celtic people of seriously lacking
sexual restraint. In reality the Celts were not nearly as rampantly
licentious as depicted. Differences is social conduct and moral code were all
too often misread as simple promiscuity. There is a surviving account by the
Roman writer Dio Cassius who quotes the rebuttal of a Celtic woman accused of
promiscuity by a Roman matron:

[...] ‘We fulfill the demands of
nature in a much better way than do you Roman women, for we consort openly
with the best men, whereas you let yourselves be debauched in secret by the
vilest.’”

“The practice of polygamy in Celtic society was carefully
controlled and strictly regulated. Although Celtic men -- and on occasion
women -- were permitted to have more than one mate, the laws surrounding
these relationships were infinitely and meticulously detailed.”

“Whereas obesity was rather common and acceptable in Rome and Greece, it was so repugnant to the
Celts that actual punishments in the form of fines were imposed on those who
exceeded the weight limit set by the community. Strabo writes:

‘They try not to become stout and fat-bellied, and any
young man who exceeds the standard length of the girdle is fined.’”

·Holding
a certain mean between lavishness and greediness…perhaps uniting, as they
certainly did, these two seemingly opposite qualities. Their chief men were
specially lavish through their desire of good report.

·They
were, moreover, a race skilful in flattery, given to the study of
eloquence, so that the very boys were orators, a race altogether unbridled
unless held firmly down by the yoke of justice.

·They
were enduring of toil, hunger, and cold whenever fortune laid it on
them,

·Given to
hunting and hawking,

·Delighting
in…all the weapons and garb of war.’

That quick
adaptability Geoffrey mentions expressed itself in the shrewd Norman
willingness to

·Take on
local men of talent, to

·Marry
the high-born local women;

·Confidently
illiterate Norman masters used the literate clerks of the church for their
own purpose.

Their success at
assimilating was so thorough, few modern traces remain, whether in Palermo [Sicily] or Kiev [Ukraine].”

“The Amish see manyevils in the public schools,
which is why they prefer their own private ones. In 1965, one Amish writer
listed some of the things which concern parents about public schools,
including being foreign to the Bible’s teachings; the appropriateness of
companions, environment, and teachers; evolution, atheism, patriotism,
and the quickly changing trends away from ideas important to the Amish.Today
other concerns like the quality of education, drugs, and violence would
certainly be added to the list. Amish schools serve to protect children from
these influences.”

“By the 1860s, many
Mennonites had become used to the idea of voting, serving as school
directors, and even holding local offices. Generally, Republican Party
candidates got the Amish and Mennonite vote. Two notable exceptions were the
Hessian Amish at Danvers, IL, and the Amish of Holmes Co., Ohio, where GermanTownship had a nearly unanimous Democrat Party voting pattern.”

“The Pennsylvania Dutch are
direct descendants of the Hermunduri tribes, which existed directly to the
north of Rome in early Roman times, and which a little later became the
Alamanni tribe, taking in a few others (Alamanni means ‘all men’)…The Alamanni
were admittedly the most formidable and competent of the Germanic tribes of
the time, establishing even then a reputation for independence and rebellion...”